Connoisseuship in the study of Attic Early Iron Age workshops

Introduction

The following information comes from the author's PhD thesis on Attic Geometric and Orientalising pottery. This is an isolated article that discusses the application of connoisseurship. Connoisseurship is another area of iconographic studies related to Greek Early Iron Age decorated finewares. It is discussed separately because it is the only approach used for the identification of Attic Geometric and Orientalising workshops and individual artists. Similar to other iconographic studies, it was based primarily on Late Geometric figurative representations.

Connoisseurship in the study of Attic Early Iron Age workshops

The first application of connoisseurship to Attic painted pottery was by John Beazley (1922). Donna Kurtz (1983; 1985) suggested that this methodology was derived from the work of the Italian art historian Giovanni Morelli, whose work was known to Beazley, perhaps through the time he spent in Italian museums studying collections of Etruscan pottery (Kurtz 1983; 1985; Robertson 1991; Whitley 1997). Beazley (1922) followed Morelli’s ideas and focused on how specific artists depicted human anatomy on Greek painted pottery. These manners were definite, coherent and distinctive, and formed a personal “system of renderings” for each painter (Beazley 1922, 84). Beazley (1922; 1946; 1951; 1956; 1963) used this logic to study the systems of renderings of various Attic painters, classify their work, define affiliated groups of artisans, and identify different schools and workshops in Archaic and Classical pottery production.

J.M. Cook (1935; 1947) was the first to use connoisseurship in the study of Protoattic pottery. He identified workshops of the EPA ‘Classical Tradition’ attributed to the Analatos painter and the Mesogeia painter, and the LPA workshop of the Nessos painter (Cook 1935; 172). Similarly, Gerba Nottbohm (1943) was the first to assign a group of Geometric vases to a particular painter, namely the Dipylon Master, opening new paths in the investigation of Attic Geometric workshops.

The first application of Beazleyan connoisseurship in a full identification of Attic Late Geometric and Early Orientalising workshops was published in 1961 by Jean M. Davison. Davison studied roughly 800 vessels (1961, 9); she summarised the work of all previous connoisseurs and identified 17 different groups of painters and broader workshops, including related schools and independent artists (hands). These comprised at least 36 artisans, including the Dipylon Master and Workshop; the Villard Workshop; the Hirschfeld Painter and Workshop; the Lion Painter; the Workshops of Athens 894 and 897; the Philadelphia, Benaki, Oxford, Birdseed, Lambros, Knickerbocker, Swan, Burly, Early Analatos, Mesogeia, and Vulture painters and workshops.

Davison’s approach was critiqued by R.M. Cook (1962) and Evelyn Smithson (1962). Both scholars argued that Davison’s investigation was limited to a small number of vessels, which accounted for about 1/5 of the material found to date. Furthermore, R.M. Cook (1962) argued that some of the groups described by Davison did not exhibit distinct characteristics that would warrant their being grouped separately. For example, the Knickerbocker Painter and the Oinochoe groups were analysed and grouped primarily in terms of abstract ornamentation and its arrangement (Cook 1962, 88). Smithson (1968, 423) also argued that some of Davison’s major groupings (1) were just composites and not real individual groups.

Davison’s groups were revised by J.N. Coldstream (1968, 29-82), who also adapted them to his chronological system (see Section 2.1.2). According to Coldstream, there were at least 21 different groups of ceramic workshops producing decorated finewares for the period between LGIa and LGIIb:

Despite the arguments of R.M. Cook (1962) and Evelyn Smithson (1962), Davison’s (1961) work and Coldstream’s revised conclusions (1968) are still accepted and widely used today.

Sarah Morris (1984) was the first to employ connoisseurship in a study that moved away from defining production units to investigating the social context of ceramic production. Morris (1984) compared Athenian and Aeginetan Orientalising finewares and concluded that ‘Attic’ Black and White wares of the Middle Protoattic period were in reality Aeginetan exports. Drawing on historical events, Morris (1984, 116) saw the possibility of a war between Athens and Aegina in the early 7th century BC, followed by Athenian recession and poverty due to an Aeginetan embargo. Both events justified the decline of Athenian Middle Protoattic ceramic workshops. Whitley (1994b, 66) argued against this point that ceramic production and consumption in Aegina and Athens were probably not related during the middle of the 7th century BC due to the different vessel shapes encountered in both contexts; therefore, both productions should be treated independently.

Bohen (1988) examined the evolution of form and decorative motifs across different types of Athenian pyxides from the Sub-Mycenaean to the Late Geometric period. Her analysis included the identification of potential workshops by examining the decorative motifs on miniature clay-horses that were attached to the top part of the ‘horse-pyxis’ vessels, following the example of Davison (1961).

The methodology of Beazleyan connoisseurship and the discussion of Davison’s (1961) Geometric workshops continue with Anne Coulié (2010; 2013; 2014) and her arguments regarding the Dipylon Workshop. In a recent re-evaluation of Davison’s (1961) conclusions, Anne Coulié (2015) argues that identifying individual artists in a traditional workshop can be more complicated than previously demonstrated. In her own analysis of the Dipylon workshop, Coulié sees the style of at least five individual artists: the Dipylon Master painter, three of his most accomplished students and a secondary student who would only decorate the surface of handles (Coulié 2015). The complexity and the innovative character of the Dipylon workshop have also been discussed by Galanakis (2013) through a combined analysis of shape and decoration.

Notes

1. 1. The Kunze Painter, the Knickerbocker Hand and Workshop, the Tapestry Hand, and the Burly Hand and Workshop.